


i pedal, you steer

by jujubes



Category: SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-09
Updated: 2019-01-09
Packaged: 2019-10-07 03:47:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,662
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17358350
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jujubes/pseuds/jujubes
Summary: Sometimes you have to reverse your vehicle before you can drive it out of the carpark. It just happens that Jihoon is the driver (and Jeonghan's the one pumping gas).





	i pedal, you steer

If you, like Jihoon, had a friend whose height hovered in the 180s and you, like Jihoon, saw said friend sitting hunched over right there on the street curb, ass to the pavement undoubtedly stained with years of mixed soju and samgyeopsal sick-up, you too would have no choice but to haul said friend to his feet and offer him a ride home. 

“It’s on the way,” Jihoon mutters, and it’s true enough, but more importantly he’s never seen Junhui look so frail and tiny as he did with his knees drawn to his chest, face down and expression difficult to make out in the fluorescent lighting. 

“The bus will be here in twelve minutes,” Junhui says. 

Jeonghan, in the midst of corralling Jisoo and Seungcheol into the back of a taxi, makes a tutting sound. “Don’t be daft. You’ve never bused back before and if you start now you’ll only get lost.”

“Okay.” He doesn’t look at Jeonghan when he’s replying to him, gaze trailing after the shadow of Wonwoo, long gone having walked up the street at least six minutes ago. 

“Hey, you’ll get to see my place!” Soonyoung says, propping an elbow up uncomfortably on Junhui’s much higher shoulder. “I call shotgun, by the way.”

Jihoon rolls his eyes. “You can’t call shotgun before you see the car.” 

“That’s okay. Junhui doesn’t mind. Right, Junhui?”

 

 

 

Junhui tries to thank him later by buying him dinner. He doesn’t say that as the purpose of the meal, but there’s no other reason for Junhui to call Jihoon out for food when Jihoon works halfway across town and Junhui and Wonwoo are doing grad programs at the same university. 

The gesture is well-intentioned and endearing but utterly unnecessary, something that probably describes most of Junhui’s endeavours. Jihoon earns at least five times Junhui’s annual salary, doesn’t have to pay tuition, and has plenty of delivery coupons at home so he never has to cook. But he remembers the way Junhui had looked sitting on the curb and feels bad enough to name a place halfway-ish between them that does really good soondae jjigae and packs up on time for once to get there early enough that they have time to eat before Junhui has to rush back to finish some weird experiment with his bees. 

They talk about Jihoon’s work, which is boring, and Junhui’s research, which Junhui is excited about but is also kind of boring, and then, while Junhui’s recounting some funny story about his roommate that Jihoon chuckles at, Jihoon’s phone vibrates with a text. 

He looks down, reads the text that flashes across the screen, then looks up. 

Junhui offers a hesitant smile. “Something urgent?”

“No—yes.” Jihoon presses the sleep button. “When are you going to make up with Wonwoo?”

The text is from Wonwoo, asking where he is. Wonwoo never asks where Jihoon is, not even when he wants Jihoon to come over so they can play Overwatch together. Those messages read “come over”, and as much as Jihoon is welcome to say “can’t”, it’s not like Wonwoo ever leaves it open-ended, doesn’t ask if he’s busy or free or what he’s up to. 

“Oh,” Junhui says. He fidgets, then offers Jihoon his rice in lieu of answering the question. 

 

 

 

It becomes a thing. 

Whenever all of them have a night free at the same time, they go for dinner. Afterward, Jihoon drives Junhui home, and a few days later, Junhui will buy him lunch, or dinner, or just a coffee as a thank you. 

Wonwoo isn’t so frigid to Junhui anymore, no longer ignores Junhui outright, sometimes even politely asks him to pass the sweet potatoes. 

“Did you used to do this, back when Wonwoo was giving you rides home?” Jihoon asks, gesturing to the noodles laid out between him and Junhui.

Junhui laughs. “Of course not,” he says. Then he frowns, as if unsure why he laughed or what that means. 

After a while, Junhui speaks again. “It wasn’t ever on his way, you know. I mean, his apartment’s in the opposite direction from campus as mine, a twenty-five minute drive without traffic.”

“Right. Why was he the one driving you home then?” 

“I don’t know,” Junhui says miserably. 

“Right,” Jihoon says again, trying to sound like he believes him. 

 

 

 

By the looks of things, that conversation must have prompted _something_ , because the next time Jihoon sees Junhui, he’s laughing into his hands while Wonwoo looks at him with lips quirked, fingers tangling with the hood of his sweater. 

Somehow, in Wonwoo’s presence, Junhui seems to take up twice as much space. It might be the gesticulating, or the loud peals of laughter constantly escaping from him, or the way he seems to bounce in his seat. It’s unbelievably different from the quiet, shrunken Junhui who appeared sitting on the sidewalk not so long ago, different, but a welcome sight. 

Junhui is still bouncing when they go outside, hanging off the back of Wonwoo’s shoulders while Jeonghan calls for a taxi. 

He doesn’t think Junhui even notices. But when Junhui lets go of Wonwoo to slide behind Soonyoung, joining him and Jihoon on their way to Jihoon’s car, Jihoon looks back in surprise and catches it. The way Wonwoo’s entire expression flattens is terrifying, instantaneous. He doesn’t look angry at all, which is precisely how Jihoon knows he’s furious, eyes utterly devoid of emotion. Meanwhile, Junhui’s tugging on Soonyoung’s arm with one hand and grabbing Jihoon’s elbow with the other. 

Jihoon wonders, if you had a friend whose height hovered in the 180s and you saw said friend storm off angrier than you’d ever seen him before, would you really run after him to calm him down or would you, like Jihoon, fear for your life?

 

 

 

“I think,” Jihoon says, “I’m getting between Junhui and Wonwoo.”

“Au contraire. I think you’re finally getting them together.” Jeonghan pulls his coffee closer to himself and takes a whiff. For the past two years, they’ve worked in the same office complex but Jihoon still isn’t quite sure what Jeonghan does. All he knows is that it nets him quite a sum of money. 

Jihoon stares into his own drink, dark liquid contrasting the light foam in Jeonghan’s cup. “I thought I was making inroads too,” Jihoon says, “until Wonwoo got mad at him again.”

“He’s not really mad at Junhui,” Jeonghan says. He sounds fond, it’s not like he doesn’t have favourites but he does rather seem to like all of them. “But maybe if he thinks he is he’ll eventually do something about it.”

“Err.”

“In all the time we’ve known him, has Junhui ever been in a relationship?”

Jihoon ponders this for a moment. “No?”

“And who do you think has surely noticed that?”

“Wonwoo?”

Jeonghan hums. “Junhui doesn’t _do_ relationships, and Wonwoo’s convinced himself that if the person he desperately wants to be in a relationship with doesn’t do relationships he can’t do relationships either.” 

Jihoon squints. “I don’t get it.”

“Don’t you?”

 

 

 

“It must be a record,” Junhui says, plastered to the back of the passenger seat in Jihoon’s car, looking like he could hit 160 centimetres tops. Jihoon thinks he should feel more triumphant about being taller than he does. “I think it was a total of two days that he wasn’t angry at me. Maybe not even 36 hours.”

“Isn’t that two—oh no that would be 48, carry on,” Soonyoung says uselessly. 

“That means you just made up 36 hours ago, so I’m sure you can do it again,” Jihoon says, making a smooth right. 

“It’s not that easy…” Junhui sighs. “If I don’t know why he’s mad, I don’t know what to apologize for, and then I can’t say sorry at all because it doesn’t sound sincere.”

That strangely sounds like a very Junhui thing to say. 

“Who cares,” Jihoon tries, trying to channel his inner Jeonghan. It sounds nothing like him.

Junhui gives Jihoon a look through the rearview mirror before withdrawing into himself again. 

“Aren’t you always talking about how Minghao’s mad at you? For everything? And you actually live with him, so it’s not a big deal, right?”

“Right, but that’s Minghao, and this is Wonwoo.”

“What’s the difference?”

“Minghao’s my _roommate_ , and Wonwoo’s—”

“Wonwoo is…?”

 

 

 

Jihoon’s not very good at shovel talks, maybe because he’s never had to give one before. Then, he’s never really had a friend like Junhui before.

“You two need to work on your verbal communication,” Jihoon says. 

Wonwoo grunts, which bodes well.

“If you ever make him look small and sad again I will personally make sure that you look as tiny and feeble as he did that time you left him to find his own way home,” Jihoon says menacingly. Wonwoo doesn’t look like he feels very threatened, even though he should. Jihoon can’t imagine a more terrifying fate. 

“Okay.” Jihoon hovers over the ‘play again’ button. “Another round?”

 

 

 

Jihoon gets stuck in traffic before the next time they have dinner together, all of them, like really all of them, including Minghao, the roommate. 

Nothing seems really different, it’s food, and drinks, and people laughing too loud and generally being too tall. It’s annoying, really, that all of Jihoon’s friends and associates are taller than him. At any rate, everything is going as usual until they’re bundling into taxis and Wonwoo starts making out with Junhui’s neck and everyone starts hollering excitedly as if Jihoon hasn’t been working on this project for _weeks_. 

“It’s about time,” Jihoon mutters, feeling a quiet glow of pride that almost no one knows about except Junhui and Wonwoo and probably Jeonghan. 

“Please stop doing that, the others are staring at us,” Junhui says, leaning into Wonwoo.

“Don’t be daft.” Jeonghan waves a hand in front of his face. “We’ve got better things to do than watch our friends kiss.”

Soonyoung rubs his hands together. “So my question is, do I still get shotgun?”


End file.
